Fairy Tail HOW I LOVE THEE!
Episode 30, "Next Generation":
HILARITY UNTIL THE END OF ALL TIME.
Oh gosh, Erza's stage fright and Lucy trying desperately to salvage the play and Natsu being the animatronic dragon and Team Natsu destroying the theater and yet getting a standing ovation and selling out all the performances after that... just too funny.
Episode 31, "A Star Removed From The Sky":
We join Team Natsu cleaning up a bandits nest. They defeat them easily and decide to head to a resort to have some downtime. There's a hilarious running gag of Juvia watching from behind rocks and pillars, stalking the group (or Gray rather) and a blinking arrow pointing her out.
Oh Juvia. You are adorable. (Even if I don't really ship you and Gray.)
Oh and we also see Loke hanging around and acting mysterious and weird. But he does turn up in the nick of time to save Lucy from a couple of creepers. He and Lucy then go have drinks together. Yay! I was hoping for more Loke/Lucy shippy goodness!
The show does not disappoint in that aspect, as Loke and Lucy have a nice conversation, Loke tells her he doesn't have long to live and then plays it off like it's a joke, Lucy gets justifiably upset and slaps him and then storms off, and Loke angsts about how it would totally not do to get close to Lucy now.
The next day, Lucy discovers that Loke's broken up with all his other girlfriends. Who turn on her thinking she's stolen Loke's heart from them. Lulz. Later at Magnolia's bathhouse, Loke turns up again to be absolutely adorable with Lucy. HNNNNNGGGH. That's it. I ship them. Unquestionably. THEY ARE SO CUTE AND PRECIOUS ASFHLASFKHALS!
Later Lucy consults one of her other celestial spirits to look up information on Loke's past encounters with celestial wizards and learns he was involved with a woman named Karen. Lucy figures out that Loke is, in fact, a celestial spirit himself. Just in time for him to disappear from the guild and go angst at Karen's grave. Lucy finds him there. Turns out he can't return to the spirit world because he killed Karen, his previous contract owner.
O.O
Uh... wow... well... darn.
Episode 32, "Celestial Spirit King":
Loke tells the story of how it happened. Karen was a cruel mistress, abusing and mistreating the spirits she had contracts with, especially Aries. Loke, as Leo the king of Zodiac celestial spirits, forced a door close and came in Aries's place to prevent Karen from being able to summon any other celestial spirits, or from using any kind of celestial wizard magic whatsoever. At least until she let him and Aries out of their contract with her. A couple months go by and he still won't yield. Karen gets desperate enough to take a dangerous mission without permission. During that mission, she tries to summon a spirit, since powerful wizards can summon more than one celestial spirit if they have enough magic. But she overtaxed herself. She didn't have enough magic to have Leo and another spirit out at the same time, so she died. And Loke/Leo was forbidden to return to the spirit world.
Damn.
Since then he's been slowly dwindling away into nothingness. Loke starts to disappear for good, but Lucy is having none of that. AND MY SHIPPER HEART SWELLS AS SHE CLUTCHES HIS BODY TO HER AND STARTS GLOWING AND SHIT TRYING TO FORCE HIS DOOR OPEN SO HE CAN RETURN TO THE SPIRIT WORLD AND RESTORE HIS ENERGY. She screams about how she's not going to let him die, that's she's going to save him, and they are OTP forever.
Oh and then time freezes and the celestial spirit king himself comes to see what's up. And Lucy, badass that she is, SNARKS AT HIM. She is so amazing here I cannot even... Anyway, she demonstrates her leet celestial wizard skills by summoning ALL of her spirits at once and gets the king to make an exception for Loke. In return for this favor, Loke has to serve Lucy. D'aww.
They return to the guild and Loke lets the rest of Team Natsu know what's up and then gives them all tickets to a resort. Nice.
Episode 33, "The Tower of Heaven":
Fina-fricking-ly I am at this arc. Stop spoiling the arcs with your openings Fairy Tail. Seriously.
Team Natsu frolics and has a good time at the beach. Then we get ERZA BACKSTORY heck yes. And Erza and Lucy look gorgeous in their dresses. Juvia too. Aww Juvia you are so cute.
Their vacation is abruptly interrupted by some of Erza's old "friends" from her slave days. They are pretty much all exceptionally creepy. They defeat Gray, Natsu, and Lucy, and capture Happy and Erza. And they're taking her back to the Tower of Heaven to see Jellal. Uh oh.
Mayhap I will finally see what all the fuss is about with them as a couple?
Lucy gets free and finds her other companions. They head off after Natsu, who's trailing "Blocky's" smell.
Episode 34, "Jellal":
The Council discovers and debates about the existence of the Tower of Heaven. Siegrain (Jellal's "twin brother", even though I've been spoiled enough to know that's not exactly the case) advises shooting some sort of magic gun spell... thing... at it to destroy it.
Team Natsu boats over to the Tower. Juvia proves how awesome she is by making a water bubble to conceal them. And then mini oxygen bubbles so they can sneak in underwater. They get discovered and proceed to epically battle the guards. Yay!
Erza, meanwhile, escapes from her captors. There are more flashbacks of her story. Poor Mini Erza is so tiny and frightened! Mini Jellal is a little heroic cutie too I guess. Grown-up Jellal is... creepy. Very, very creepy. I do not believe I like him at all.
Team Natsu (plus Juvia), make their way up into the Tower and reunite with Erza, who's trying to be all Batman and stoic and "I must do this alone." but they're having none of it. Natsu goes off to rescue Happy. Gray, Lucy, and Juvia encourage Erza and she finally turns around with tears in her eyes. Then she dishes more backstory about the Tower and the R-system spell and her life as a slave, and how she got her eye gouged out and then they took Jellal and apparently changed him so that he became completely evil and she started up a revolt. Can't wait to see how that pans out in the next episode.
Episode 35, "Voice of Darkness":
We open with Natsu looking for Happy. Who is panicking in the weird cat room of one of Erza's old friends.
But enough of that, let's get more Erza backstory! Last time in Erza's backstory, she started a revolt to free the prisoners and save Jellal. Who in the meantime is being tortured in the torture room. Yay.
The baddies leave and holy cow that is exceptionally creepy. Uh, I mean, Zeref shows up. The same entity they were attempting to revive. She/He/It, who or whatever they are, CREEP THE BEJEEZERS OUT OF ME GAH!
Back with the mini soldiers, Mini Simon asks Mini Erza if she liiikes Mini Jellal. She is adorably blushy. I have to admit though, for the fangirl hoopla surrounding this ship I was kind of expecting a little more than this. I mean, yeah she liked him as a kid but why? How did they bond? How did she come to know him? How did her feelings develop? They just drop her kidcrush in the middle of an action scene and they don't dwell on it. Whatever, magic soldiers show up and start turning the tide. They're about to deep fry Mini Erza when Grandpa Rob saves her. And... flashback within a flashback? Uhhhh... Okay? Oh and Zeref is latching onto Mini Jellal is looks like. Lovely.
AND THEN MINI ERZA GETS AWESOME AND ACTIVATES HER LATENT MAGICAL TALENT OH MY BABY HOW AWESOME YOU AAAAAARRRRREEE!
Mini Erza picks up two swords and goes to save Jellal. He is now the creep we know and... not love. Seriously. I do not like creepy possessed Jellal. He makes me want to crawl under the chair and cower. GAH! WHAT IS IT WITH THIS LIMP LOLLING ABOUT HOLY COW! Creepy Mini Jellal says that he's going to finish the Tower and revive Zeref. AND THEN KILLS THE TWO BADDIES. JEEBERS. Oh and then he blasts Mini Erza through a wall. How sweet of him.
Ugh, I am not liking this character so far. Maybe I'd think this was more tragic and heartbreaking if we'd gotten to see more of what Jellal was like pre-possesion. But I know almost nothing about him or who he is and was given no time to get attached to him. And now he's completely evil and I can't sympathize with him at all.
Anyway, back in the present, the Council is still trying to decide whether or not to shoot the Etherion. Jellal's thought projection Siegrain convinces them to. And Erza and company discuss the situation. Sho overhears them talking and is in disbelief about Jellal lying to him. Simon appears and reveals he knew Jellal was a fraud. Sho decides to crack a little bit.
And Natsu gets his head stuck in a cat mask. Lulz.
...Should I do one more episode? Maybe I'll sneak a peek at it. Oooh, new opening! Does it-?
OH FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT IS PURE AND HOLY FAIRY TAIL STOP SPOILING YOUR NEXT ARCS MIDWAY THROUGH THE PREVIOUS ARC IN YOUR NEW OPENINGS!
Yeah. I think I'm done for now. Signing out.